What a great day of fun with family and friends! And how inspiring and healing!

I really wish I had made the time to attend the family team poster event sponsored by our NICU. That display of posters for angel babies and other NICU grad families was probably the single most powerful thing I have witnessed since last February. Such beautiful loving tributes.

Amazing to see so many preemie, NICU, and birth defect affected families coming together for a cause they feel so strongly about.

Plus, I got to stand next to a NFL player!

The best part was of course the great snapshots of our son getting to enjoy a large event for the first time.

Family Team Photo

Waiting For Start

Ominous Clouds, 4 miles to go

Check Point NKY, halfway

Crossing Bridge from NKY back to Cincinnati

Crossing the finish line!

Good Sam was our NICU hospital

# of Premature births in Ohio

Why We Fight

It was a celebration, and I needed it. We exceeded our team goal by $200!

Prematurity, talk about it. Be aware. Let’s stop the #1 cause of infant mortality in the world.

Drake is very, very healthy for a 2lb-er, 30 weeker and we are still working through effects of prematurity for him. I have still needed to change my career so I can care for him in the way he needs. In addition, he’s being treated for a birth defect and had surgery at less than a year old.

First, Drake’s surgery went very well. He had no indications of respiratory distress and is recovering well after 1 week. He did seem to lose some weight as it was hard to ramp his feeds back up. He had some mouth swelling due to the hemangioma injection and sounded hoarse from the intubation.

November is prematurity awareness month, culminating in World Prematurity Day on November 17th. I encouage everyone to take this month and learn more about the impact premature birth has on our country and the world.

In the US alone, 1 in 8 babies are born prematurely each year. That’s over half a million preterm infants. The effects of preterm birth are wide ranging from being the leading cause of infant death to developmental issues that continue throughout life.

How can we help reduce the number of babies BORN TOO SOON?

Take the time to review information at the March of Dimes and their research into prematurity and birth defects.

Here are some great resources and preemie parents’ blogs.

March of Dimes – supports research, parent information while a child is in NICU

Kentucky Special Born Too Soon Report – Kentucky has one of the highest rates of prematurity in the US. I am fortunate enough to live in the Cincinnati metro area with amazing resources like Cincinnati Children’s and Good Samaritan Hospital, but many areas of our state are rural. Let’s work on 39 weeks Kentucky!

Life with Jack – the journey of a 23 week miracle micropreemie and his family